cely communicate our perceptions
to minds pre-occupied by different objects, any more than the delight of
well-disposed colours or harmonious sounds can be imparted to such as
want the senses of hearing or of sight.

I am so strongly convinced of the justness of this remark, and have on
so many occasions discovered with how little attention pride looks upon
calamity of which she thinks herself not in danger, and indolence
listens to complaint when it is not echoed by her own remembrance, that
though I am about to lay the occurrences of my life before you, I
question whether you will condescend to peruse my narrative, or, without
the help of some female speculatists, to be able to understand it.

I was born a beauty. From the dawn of reason I had my regard turned
wholly upon myself, nor can recollect any thing earlier than praise and
admiration. My mother, whose face had luckily advanced her to a
condition above her birth, thought no evil so great as deformity. She
had not the power of imagining any other defect than a cloudy
complexion, or disproportionate features; and therefore contemplated me
as an assemblage of all that could raise envy or desire, and predicted
with triumphant fondness the extent of my conquests, and the number of
my slaves.

She never mentioned any of my young acquaintance before me, but to
remark how much they fell below my perfection; how one would have had a
fine face, but that her eyes were without lustre; how another struck the
sight at a distance, but wanted my hair and teeth at a nearer view;
another disgraced an elegant shape with a brown skin; some had short
fingers, and others dimples in a wrong place.

As she expected no happiness nor advantage but from beauty, she thought
nothing but beauty worthy of her care; and her maternal kindness was
chiefly exercised in contrivances to protect me from any accident that
might deface me with a scar, or stain me with a freckle: she never
thought me sufficiently shaded from the sun, or screened from the fire.
She was severe or indulgent with no other intention than the
preservation of my form; she excused me from work, lest I should learn
to hang down my head, or harden my finger with a needle; she snatched
away my book, because a young lady in the neighbourhood had made her
eyes red with reading by a candle; but she would scarcely suffer me to
eat, lest I should spoil my shape, nor to walk lest I should swell my
ancle with a sprain. At night I w